the Pineapple King

So, I left out the third member of our household: the pineapple light in the upstairs hallway. It's something we completely missed on all of our visits to the house until the final walk-through. I named him Pete.

While our other brassy fixtures will be voted off the island or face the might of Rustoleum's oil rubbed bronze spray, we are going to embrace Pete in all his glory. Because how could you not? He is cheerfully providing light at the end of the hall, and we both love pineapple.

We thought Pete was a unique quirk to the house, but apparently he's got brethren in households across the U.S. Pineapples it turns out, aside from being delicious, are a symbol of hospitality and happy homes.

So Pete stays! If we do anything, it'll be to clean and polish him up. Who wants to mess with his happiness?

And so it begins ...

Note: Much of this post will be recap, as we have been busy these past 10 days. Apologies for the time warp!

On December 20, 2013, Mike and I walked into a bank and walked out with keys to our family home, a 1983 colonial that was bigger than what we were looking for and didn't hit everything on our "list," but it was pretty much love the moment we crossed the threshold. She is rather imposing on the outside, but inside she is perfectly outdated, and the layout was exactly what we had been looking for - a wonderful mix of openness and separation - and the two-story foyer also lends to a more open feeling.

Check out that hot 80s chandelier action! That little carpeted ledge above it? We figure that's where we'll place "treasure" for our future children to try to get to while we go out to a movie or something. Cheaper than a babysitter, as long as we don't have to go to ER later ...

Mike and I want to put our own touch on a home, so we are pleased that this big, beautiful girl hasn't undergone any major remodels, other than adding hardwood in the kitchen. When you walk in, the library is on your left and the dining room on the right, and down the hall is the kitchen-eating-family room stretch. The library was one of our must haves in a house. We wanted a main-level room for our home library that could be open to the family but also separated when necessary (such as me writing, or Mike needing some quiet reading time). This house actually had a designated library complete with french doors and built-in shelves. Um, yes, please!

It does look better with books in it. ;-) More to come on that! The library opens to the foyer and the family room, which is perfect! I have to admit, the library made up for some of our missing wishlist.

Next is a round of family room photos, as we love this room and it should be seen from many angles. It's a room we love and are also stumped on how to properly arrange it. In the first photo, you can see the opening to the library and the kitchen to get a feel on the flow in this house. That's Mike checking out our non-working intercom system (which we laughed at and now kinda wished worked). There's a built-in wet bar next to him. We actually looooove the beams in this room and will not touch them, even as we consider painting trim white. Not in this room, mister! These beams are sacred. They give it such a cozy, homey feeling.

The carpet is actually a sort of drying hay green color. We have a brown couch and sky blue love seat, so it'll be interesting to see how that works out.

The family room also has a big, gas fireplace that is apparently in good shape but needs a serious cleaning before we fire it up. And some draft fixing. The fireplace is also part of our arrangement conundrum. Where do we put the TV? The previous owners had it in front of the right window before the step up to kitchen, but we want to let in as much light as possible. Above the fireplace is not TV-friendly, despite so many people doing it, so it'll probably be on the west wall (left of the photo), but then what to do with the couches? I hate to have a couch back facing the opening to the kitchen, but that's probably what will happen.

So now for the kitchen. It's dated but very comfortable and the cabinets are in fantastic shape. We'll probably paint them and swap out the hardware, but the big change will be swapping out the yellowed laminate countertops for soapstone and butcher block. Some day. Mike wants to knock out the upper cabinets in the left photo to open the space more, but I convinced him to see if we need that storage first. We might compensate by building a pantry in the laundry room (to the right of the kitchen). Off camera is the fridge and pantry.

Oh yes, and the entire kitchen is wallpapered. It's some sort of white, textured stuff that we are thinking about painting over, because we kind of like it but the space needs some freshening. 

Then we having the dining room. Where you can also see some awesome 80s border and wallpaper for the chair rail. We like the painted tray ceiling, but not the wallpaper. The chandelier, however, is evil. I nearly concussed myself putting up the Christmas tree. EVIL.

That's the previous owners' rug and chair. Anyhoo, while I abhor the laminate in the kitchen (the color not the material), Mike detests the white tile featured in the dining room and foyer. He's itching to hardwood it, but we want to do that when it's time to refinished the hardwood we have - and there's still plenty of life in it, minus some very worn areas.

To the right of the kitchen is the pukefully yellow laundry room. It's a nice room, but it glowed in such a sickly way that this became our first project (coming soon!). Along with the lovely cabinets and sink, there is another set of overhead cupboards to the left of the photo. We do need to fix the crank on the window, because doesn't open. But being 10 degrees outside, we're not too hurried.

Now we're going to jump around a bit - 2 floors at the same time! Between the laundry room and kitchen is a the first floor half bath, but I've paired it with the upstairs shared bath. Both have some wallpaper features, though I have to say the upstairs' bath tile really takes the prize. It's in too good of shape to rip out, so we're going to live with it for a looong time, but I have no idea how to redecorate with it.

So, now for an upstairs shot. Please don't mind the weird lighting situation. Interesting note: the county tax assessor and the bank's appraiser listed two different square footage amounts. This is a common issue when you have these two-story foyers or other rooms, because the tax man bases his assessment on the exterior measurements, more or less, and the appraiser measures ACTUAL living space, so we pay the county for the air between the hall and the window ledge but the bank does not consider it of value. 

Upstairs has four bedrooms, though I'm not going to show them all. Just the Blue Room and the master. The other two (green and beige) are your standard squares with a window and closet. The blue room is the room I'd totally claim if it wasn't for the whole "adults sleep in the master" thing.

The blue is actually much darker than this photo (window on the left, door to hallway on right). But it's got a built in desk nook and walk-in closet, which I something I totally love. We think we'll use it as a guest room for now, until a future munchkin grows out of a nursery and wants a bigger room. Right now Mike has the beige room as his office, and the green room, the farthest from the master, will be the nursery. Which makes total sense, right? Maybe we'll swap the guest into the green, and the nursery into the blue. I don't know. Not preggers yet, so we've got time.

So ... onto the master suite.

The awkwardly, embarrassingly GINORMOUS master. We actually got turned off from the house because of this room. Our previous house had a big master, or what we felt was a big master, and this one gulped it up. And didn't burp. 

This picture does not convey the sheer enormity of this room, but trust me, it's HUGE. The previous owners had a king in here, and it basically looked like a full. Everyone says to put in a fireplace and sitting area in here, too, which we are thinking about doing (with an electric fireplace), but for now it's painting and moving in the bed. We want to upgrade our frame and are looking into four posters. Why not? We also will need to find some proper dressers. We are striving not to keep on with the "fresh out of college" assortment of furniture, but we're cheap and bargain hunters, so it'll be a challenge.

The worst of wallpaper is in the master bathroom, which is also carpeted (shudder). The blue/brown tile around the tub is in good shape and we like it, so we'll keep it. But we are going to rip out the carpet, de-biege the walls, paint the trim, and take out the wallpaper in the toilet/shower room. Oh, and paint the cabinets.

The back of the house has screened sunroom (not climate controlled), and although the lot is waaaaay smaller than Mike was hoping for, the BEST compromise for that is this:

The lake is about a block from our house. Walking and biking trails abound, but we are also hoping we can find a good spot to launch our sailboats once it warms up. This was a HUGE selling point, since this house was at my max comfort zone on price and not in our preferred school district (still a good district, but not our #1 community). What did this house lack? A large yard, our school district, a three car garage or walkout basement (for the boats), and not as much hardwood as Mike would like. 

What did it have? That instant home feeling. The lake. In great shape, minus the geriatric furnace, and with enough cosmetic needs to get us excited. Oh, and the library. The family room, the entryway. Mike's kitchen. The fact we can see ourselves here for the next 20-30 years until the kids move out and we get tired of going up and down those stairs. 

There will be more to come!